Blind Resurrection
by Mizuki Yagami
Summary: During Harry's fight for the philosophers stone, Harry finds himself going blind. Things go downhill as the Chamber of Secrets is opened and Harry finds a friend in a journal. Eventual slash. -WARNING
1. Chapter 1

This is my pet project, one I am not likely to finish. ^^ but i thought you might enjoy a taste... and maybe convince me to write more. Writers block sux and nothing is a better cure than insomnia and feedback (doesn't matter weather it's good or bad since i have tough skin)

Ironic how Harry's final challenge was both the easiest and the most dangerous that he'd come to face over his first year of Hogwarts. Harry felt the skin crack and crumble under his hands as his defence teacher pulled away in both shock and agony. He watched what was left of Professor Quirrell disintegrate into a grey dust, and with a strong sense of foreboding watched the soul of the Dark Lord Voldemort rush towards him before phasing through his body. His scare flared up sending pulses of pain shooting through his body, his head began to throb and he felt his senses begin to fade. His vision went black and there was a feeling of falling, then nothing.

Harry woke up in the hospital wing, the sterile smell and the lack of snoring from a certain roommate *ron* gave it away. Harry opened his eyes a fraction, noting the utter darkness before closing his eyes again, rolling over in hopes of falling asleep until the morning arrived.

"Harry?" the familiar sound of the voices of Ron and Hermione caught his attention. He struggled to sit up, while every molecule of his body protested. Once he had positioned himself, he made the effort to open his exhausted eyes.

He gasped. Looking around his eyes met nothing but black, and he began to panic. "Ron? Hermione? Where are you?"

"We're right here mate" Said a resigned Ron Weasley.

"Harry, Calm down." Hermione said as she grabbed Harry's flailing hands, steadying them with her own. "Madam Pomfrey?" She called as soon as Harry had settled.

Harry heard the footsteps of the slightly frantic Head-nurse of the Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry. He felt the rim of a potion pressed against his lips. "Harry, dear. Please drink this." She said in as calm a voice as she could manage. Harry began to swallow the potion. He felt the calming effects of the potion, instantly registering that this would most definitely be bad news. He heard the sound of the medi-witch straightening up her uniform and let out a nervous laugh. "Harry, I'm afraid we have some bad news. You're optic nerves have been severed, they have been irreparably damaged by a powerful dark magic." She said in a grave tone. "You're blind, permanently. All of the staff, including Albus Dumbledore, have looked at it, none of them have been able to come up with a possible cure."

Hermione interrupted the nurse "Don't worry Harry! It's not hopeless Harry! Dumbledore is working on a charm that will allow you to use your inner eye to visualize things, like divination. It will absorb ambient magic around the school and use it to fuel the charm. It will only work for 9 hours and then it will need to be charged." She blathered on.

Madam Pomfrey shushed the girl before saying "However this is only in Hogwarts my dear, because of all the powerful wards, wizards, and children who haven't gained complete control of their magic yet there is more than enough stray magic to go around. However the same is not true of all places. Some places you will have only a few minutes of 'sight' thanks to the amulet."

He heard a quiet shocked gasp escape from the lips of the Weasley boy and Muggleborn girl as Albus spoke showing that his entrance had been just as unnoticed and startling to them. "But, My Boy, This charm unfortunately requires some careful casting and participation of many of the other members of staff. Specifically our Potions Professor, who is at the moment brewing a complicated potion for the ritual needed to enchant an item to tap into ones inner eye. It's a very complex process and I ask you to remain patient whilst we construct it. It should be ready in a weeks' time though, my boy. For now though I believe that it's best for you to rest." The Headmaster finished. Harry felt his eyes begin to droop as Madam Pomfrey's wand began to glow, the last thing he heard was the headmaster shooing his fellow housemates out of the hospital wing.

Over the week Harry began to get used to being blind, he figured that the same way that the best way to learn a language was to be immersed and therefore forced to, it would be easier to get used to being blind because well... he was forced to. Not that his eyesight had ever really been very useful to begin with, he was blind as a bat and his cheap reading glasses didn't really do much to help the matters, how he'd ever caught that snitch he'd never know. His other senses had always been more sensitive than his sight, he could hear things that other boys couldn't which had come in very useful in games of 'Harry Hunting'. His enhanced sense of smell had always come in handy while cooking for the Dursleys who'd always been particularly picky on how well done their food had been, however after the food was done it became more of a curse than a blessing seeing as he would have to smell the food he'd slaved over for the rest of the night when he was lucky to be sent off with a burned piece of toast for dinner.

Though the inability to see had left him feeling vulnerable, the darkness that surrounded him now left him strangely at ease. He had always been more partial to the small and dark rather than the large and bright, he supposed all his time inside his small dark cupboard, his only safe place, taught him that. The problem was, when you were in a large dark room, you feel very uncomfortable because you don't know what's out there. Harry soon found that if he pushed his arms against the edges of the bed in just a way he could fool his body into thinking there were walls surrounding him, allowing him to think of the bed as if it was a small dark coffin. Harry laughed a little at the thought as he said "I vant to suck your blood" He then felt his cheeks flush as he desperately hoped no one was close enough to hear him.

Yes, he really could deal with being blind, after all he'd just been thrown into a world where magic exists, magical creatures exist, fairy tales are real, and oh yeah there was an evil villain out for his blood. Sure this was going to be a HUGE adjustment, but he'd been adjusting his whole life just to survive. This wouldn't be too much of a challenge. At least that's what he hoped.

During his time in the hospital wing, Harry had begun experimenting with his face, as any young boy or girl might have done. He found that although he was blind he could still feel it if he poked his eye, it'd been an interesting discovery seeing as Hermione entered and went to comfort his 'crying' shortly after. He could just imagine her disapproving look as he told her that his eyes were just watering cause he poked them too hard. Another interesting thing that he'd accidentally discovered due to an itch was that he now had feeling in his scar. In fact it was now more sensitive than the rest of his body, just by brushing his fingers over it sent a wave of chills running down his spine and the thought of someone else 'taking advantage' of it sent ice-fire through his veins inevitably ending with a 'small problem' which thankfully nobody had seen , or at least nobody had admitted to seeing.

Harry was introduced into the world of Sexuality rather young, seeing as Dudley was the delinquent he was, had gotten his hands on porn very early, and planted them in Harry's cupboard for a good hiding spot and someone to pin it on if they were ever found. This gave Harry constant access, and eventually he gave into the temptation of the playboy knockoffs which rested underneath his comforter.

This was followed by a more surprising realization, He was gay... or at the very least bisexual. During his times in his cupboard with the little treasures he often found himself visualizing things, and instead of imagining himself in the place of the overly endowed male he'd imagine himself in the place of the female. Sometimes he would envision himself in the position of the male, but those visions usually ended up out of control and him and the other male would be fighting for dominance, a battle he continuously lost.

He was pulled out of his musings about his past and personal life by the sound of several pairs of feet rushing into the infirmary and collecting around his hospital bed before going silent. "Come in." Harry said to the group and he heard a gasp from Hermione who obviously thought they were being very quiet, before the curtains around the hospital bed were opened.

"Hello, Harry. We've finished preparing the charm." said professor McGonagall. The blind boy heard the rustling of clothing and the feeling of a cold metal chain settling around his neck. He felt the presence of a new muscle, for a lack of a better word. He cautiously went to stretch this muscle, aware of everyone waiting anxiously around him. Suddenly there was a flicker of white haze. His eyes shot open and he saw the room. Everything he saw was covered in a constantly moving white foggy layer. He saw that there were more people there than he had originally thought. Hermione, Ron, Professors McGonagall, Flitwick, Snape, Headmaster Dumbledore, and Madam Pomfrey were all gathered around him watching him carefully. It seemed the more magically powerful a person was the thicker the fog around them. The headmaster was barely visible through this layer of glaze while Hermione and Ron were very easily visible.

"I can see." Harry said incredulously.

"Ummm... Mate." Ron began nervously. "Can you close your eyes mate... they... they're kinda creepy.

"Oh, yeah, sure." Harry said quickly. He shut his eyes tightly, yet the image didn't even falter. A huge grin broke across his face. "This is bloody brilliant!"

"Can you really see Harry?" Hermione said cautiously. "How many fingers am I holding up?"

Harry looked at her hand for a moment before answering "Four" Hermione frowned and the sparkle disappeared from Dumbledore's eyes. "Four... FINGERS. One Thumb." Hermione sighed. Dumbledore chuckled gaining back his nearly permanent twinkle and Ron looked puzzled for a second then promptly punched Harry in the arm.

"Had me going for a second there mate!" Ron blurted.

Harry winced but his grin didn't leave. "Headmaster, does this mean I can go back to class?" He asked.

"Why yes my boy! In fact I encourage it. Go out there and enjoy the world. We can't have you wasting away your youth in a hospital bed can we?" Dumbledore said as he saw Madam Pomfrey was about to argue, she quickly backed off. "Harry, I do ask however that you be nice to poor Madam Pomfrey and come and visit her next week so she can be sure you're all right. I would also ask you to come and visit me after classes today. We have much to talk about." Dumbledore added.

Harry's grin faded from his face. "Yes Sir." There were some questions that Harry needed answered.

Later on in Dumbledore's office "Good Evening Harry." Said Dumbledore

"Hello, Sir" Harry replied politely. "The Philosophers stone, is it safe now?" Harry asked.

"In a manner of speaking" Dumbledore replied. "It has been destroyed. By the way my boy, have you been back to your dorm today?" Harry shook his head. "Well you might find it buried in tokens from your admirers. You see you'd been in a coma for 3 days and in the hospital for 6 more. Well... What happened in the dungeons between you and Professor Quirrell is a complete secret, so, naturally, the whole school knows about it. The involvement of Professor Snape, however is known by none but myself, you and Hermione. And I plan to keep it that way." Said Dumbledore.

"The stone's destroyed? What about Nicolas Flamel?" Harry asked.

"Nicolas Flamel and his wife have enough elixir to finish their affairs, and then I'm afraid they will die. Fortunately for them it will be just like them falling asleep after a very, very long day. Remember my boy, Death is the greatest Adventure." Dumbledore explained.

"I know Snape isn't really evil, he's to obviously evil to really be evil. One thing I don't know is, does he really hate me or is that part of the act." Harry mused.

"Excellent use of logic my boy!" Dumbledore praised "Unfortunately he really does hate you. Your father bullied him for many years then finally did something Snape could never forgive."

"What was that?" Harry asked curiously. He was rather upset about Snape though, he was a cruel teacher but under different circumstances He could really see himself becoming friends with the man.

"He saved his live." Dumbledore said in an amused voice. "He couldn't bear to be in his tormentor's debt." Dumbledore shock his head.

"Voldemort, he'll try to come back again, won't he?" Harry asked knowingly and Dumbledore nodded solemnly. "How long?" Harry asked.

"I'm afraid your guess is as good as mine," Dumbledore replied.

"Why did Quirrell... Why couldn't Quirrell touch me?" Harry faltered.

"When your mother sacrificed herself to save you that night, her love cast a protective shield around you protecting you from evil trying to harm you. Voldemort cannot touch you as long as you have this shield." Dumbledore lectured. "Lemon Drop?"

Harry politely declined before saying something about opening some 'tokens' and headed off to his common room. Once he arrived he was surprised to see that some of his housemates had taken the liberty to take all gifts for him and pile them on his bed. Harry looked at it longingly, he wanted nothing more that to take the charmed pendant off and flop on his bed, but alas. Roughly shoving all the gifts onto the floor, figuring anything breakable will be protected by charms he quickly cleared his bed. He took his pendant off and felt the edge of the bed, quickly flopping onto it and releasing a loud content sigh.


	2. Chapter 2

The rest of the school year past uneventfully. Dumbledore had stored some of his magic into the wards so they would release more magic to fuel Harry's pendant. Summer came quickly and because Harry was blind he was no longer able to do the masses of chores around the house and the messes that had been left for Harry stayed scattered around the house. This forced Petunia to pick up even more of the chores around the house making her in a less than happy mood, even when dealing with her precious Duddykins. Harry still helped with what he could but for the most part stayed out of the way. There were less beatings too, and Mr. Dursley muttered an awful lot about "not beating cripples... even freakish cripples". All in all it was a decent summer, and by decent, he meant the best he'd ever had. He finished learning brail and Hermione had sent him several books in brail and pointed him in the right direction for getting textbooks in brail. 'In case he wanted to start reading his textbooks early' she said. She'd also pestered him about his homework, which Harry had finished shortly after arriving because there wasn't really much else to do. Mrs. Weasley, bless her soul had charmed Ron and Hermione's letters to speak to him so that he could hear what they were saying. A simple charmed quill worked wonders for sending letters in return. Hermione had made a remark about the first time 'his' writing had been legible. Harry had to laugh at that, but soon the summer was over and it was time to head back to Hogwarts.

Harry met with Hermione and Ron as soon as he stepped out of the car, Harry had a little charge inside the pendant because he'd left it alone for a good portion of the summer. It had collected some charge from the wards and his own magic during the summer but Harry doubted it would last too long. Hermione led Harry to the bookstore to retrieve the books of the last minute replacement for the DADA Teacher's books. It seemed that Mrs. Weasley was all in a tizzy because their new teacher would be Professor Lockhart. He was a rather famous author whose books were almost too impossible to have been achieved all by one man. Harry walked in to the store, his arm linked with Hermione's, He heard a man shouting over an excited crowd. He said he would be offering to sign his books for the small fee of 3 Galleons. Harry snickered, in the muggle world such a person would often be written off as a sell-out and just plain obnoxious. He could instantly see that his was going to be a long class, much like last year. It's not that Harry didn't like the DADA course, in fact he thought it was brilliant, but he'd heard rumours that the position was cursed. No DADA teacher could last for more than a year and most of them were useless as teachers. Now Harry wasn't one to listen to rumours, but in this case he really hoped the rumour was true. He didn't know if he could put up with the man for anymore than a year, even then he wasn't sure that he could even do that.

"Why the FAMOUS Harry Potter! Ladies and Gentlemen, the blessed Boy-Who-Lived has come into this humble bookstore to receive his school books with my grand signature on them. Well, let it never be said that I was the one to deny the boy of such a thing. In fact..." Lockhart waved over to one of the store employees "I'll be giving him the full collection of my books each and everyone personally signed by me. Here you go Harry, now Smile for the Prophet!" the flash went off before Harry could even find his bearings. Mrs. Weasley clamoured over to him exclaiming about how much of an honour that was and that he should trust her with the books for safe keeping, after all they'll really be worth something some day. Harry handed them over without a fuss, he really didn't give a rat's arse about the books. He just wanted to get out of this overly crowded bookstore. By now his pendant had nearly run out of magic and the images he got were dark and cloudy. Harry eventually gave up and let the crowd carry him with the flow. This soon led him to a darker corner of the shop, where some of the Magical History Books resided. Harry stared aimlessly at a wall taking of the now nearly useless pendant. He was sticking it into his pocket when his scar suddenly flared. It was not the same kind of flare that he'd had before with Professor Quirrell but a different kind of feeling. Though he couldn't quite place the feeling, it upset his stomach, his head turned at a breakneck speed that sent an ache through his muscles staring uselessly off in the direction which he could hear the Weasley crew trying to collect themselves. There was something over there, some familiar sort of magic. Harry found himself drawn to the strangely familiar magic, and stared off in its direction mesmerized.

"Are you okay?" Hermione asked placing her hand on Harry's shoulder. Harry jumped turning to look at her, feeling the draw of the mysterious magic fade. He felt Hermione shiver through her hand on his shoulder and Harry realized that his eyes were still open, he quickly shut them and grab her hand, squeezing it comfortingly. Harry then allowed himself to be lead back through the crowds to where the Weaselys had gathered.


	3. Chapter 3

Once harry was home, he collapsed onto his bed. Mrs. Weasley had been convinced to let Harry keep his books by Hermione who said that he needed the extra time to study. She grudgingly gave the books up and charmed them to read aloud to Harry when he opened them. He folded over the corners of the pages that he'd managed to get through, which was not many. The book was filled with boring facts about Mr. Lockhart and some interesting stories scattered through them. Overall the books were filled with bragging, boasting, and rambling. Harry only grew to despise the man more, people who readily took fame, embraced it in such a shameless way. It disgusted him.

Harry had gotten through most of his other textbooks though, and he's read over his Potions book twice, just in case. By the time Hogwarts came around, Harry had read through his textbooks, except for Lockhart's, he would probably just wing the class anyway.

The Weasleys picked up harry in a rather normal looking car, and Mr. Dursley mumbled about the "freaks learning" and dismissed harry with a grunt. Harry smiled and waved to where assumed that the Durselys would be gathered not to see him off but rather to make sure that he actually leaves. Harry wished he could have seen Mr. Dursely's face when the car turned invisible to muggles and floated off into the sky. On the trip Mr. and Mrs. Weasley took turns trying to pour some magic into Harry's pendant so that he could see for a while on the train and the carriage ride.

They met up with Hermione before getting on the train. The ride was rather short, as Harry and Hermione talked about some of the theories from the Charms textbook, and Ron pigged out on some of the treats that Harry had gotten for him from the cart while his sister listened to Harry and Hermione in their debate.

Harry, Hermione, Ron and Ginny climbed into the last carriage beside a fair blonde haired girl. "Hello" she said airily "I'm Luna Lovegood."

"And I'm Harry Potter" Harry replied, expecting some sort of reaction.

"I know" she said in the same dismissive airy tone, "The nargles told me who you were" she elaborated. Harry decided that he liked this girl. The ride was quiet until they could see the castle starting to loom over them. The students felt a jolt, and suddenly the carriage stopped and then dropped, the wheels spinning off into the forest.

Luna was the first to jump out of the cart, "The house elf has decided that we must walk, come along. I know the way." Luna said as if to nobody.

Harry was the next to get up, heading to the edge of the cart, Hermione quickly jumped up to help him onto the path. They were walking for about ten minutes before they saw a lantern coming down the path ahead of them. As they got closer they saw that the lantern was held by Professor Snape.

"Harry Potter. How you have managed to get yourself into trouble, before the semester has even begun astounds me. Come along, I have been sent to retrieve you." Professor Snape drawled before dramatically turning and stalking back off down the path, his robes flourishing behind him. Harry and the others shrugged and kept walking, continuing after professor Snape.

They reached the school after the speech presenting Lockhart as their new teacher, and after the feast had already started. There was a mild fuss as the sorting hat was brought back out and placed on the Ginny and Luna. Ginny was sent to Griffindor and Luna to Ravenclaw. Hagrid was sent out soon after to retrieve the carriage that had been left out on the path after the mysterious crash.

After the sorting, Harry began to fill his plate with a variety of the foods represented on the platters before him. He took a large class of pumpkin juice and chugged it, quickly but carefully shoving his food into his mouth trying to finish his meal before they were all sent to their dorm. After Harry and the others had finished their meals and socializing with the Griffindors they had not seen since last year the headmaster sent them off to their dorms and their beds.

The next morning professor Mcgonagall handed them their schedules and they went off to class. This time Harry was ready for all of his classes, though that left him very bored it gave him more time to read some of the books he'd borrowed from the library. The librarian had been nice enough to charm the books so that only he could hear them so he wasn't disrupting his classes and he didn't need to use his pendant.

Something he wasn't prepared for though was professor Lockhart's class. It wasn't because it was incredibly hard, but his professor was completely incompetent. In his class, all that really happened were tests on things as insignificant as his favourite colour and the time that he had released a bunch of Cornish Pixies in class then fled when he couldn't handle them, leaving them to the students to deal with.

Harry's second year was going rather well all things considered until he started to fall ill, after dinner one night with a sore stomach. He brushed it off and ignored it, but it wouldn't go away, he started feeling weak and getting chills three days later. However it was when he started getting dizzy and hearing strange hissy voices that he decided to visit the nurse.

Madam Pomfrey scolded him for waiting so long and rushed to get some parchment for his scan. She ran the scan and stared at the diagnosis before running out of the infirmary. A few stressful minutes later he heard two sets of footprints heading into the infirmary at a brisk pace.

"Harry, my boy. Have you eaten anything strange?" Dumbledore asked.

"Only food from the feasts, Sir" Harry replied confused "Is it food poisoning?"

He could almost feel Dumbledore's confusion and displeasure. "Well don't worry my boy, your symptoms should be gone in a few days." He said handing Harry a vial. Harry accepted the vial and managed to down the whole thing.

Over the next couple of days Harry saw that Madam Pomfrey began making his food, and when people where let in they weren't able to bring in any sweets. No matter how hard Ron tried or where he hid them. Hermione brought him his homework and showed him the spells that they had been practicing in class. However since harry was still recovering he found that he was sleeping for most of the time.

One morning he once again woke up to see his breakfast sitting there waiting for him, charmed to stay warm. One thing that was different this time is that he was seeing a small elf sitting over his meal poring a small purple potion over it. The house elf looked him in the eye and it began to freak out, it began to run around the room bashing it's head off objects. "Bad Dobby! Bad Dobby poisoned Master Harry Potter!" it screamed.

"What's going on? Poisoned?" Harry asked.

"Yes, Dobby poisoned Master Harry so he would leave. Bad things will happen to Harry Potter if he stays. Master Malf… Bad men will do bad things if Harry Potter doesn't leave. Dobby thought blind Harry would not come to school, but Dobby was wrong." Dobby wailed beating himself on one of the nearby beds.

Just then Dumbledore walked into the room. "Dobby," said the Headmaster. "Don't worry about Harry, I'm keeping a careful eye on him." Dumbledore explained to the even more startled house elf.

"Master Dumbledore… will watch Master Harry?" Dobby asked. Dumbledore nodded and a big grin spread over the small house elfs face as he popped away.

"Well that was quite amusing" said the old headmaster in a light tone. "At least we know you won't get sick anymore. Dobby is a good elf who is just a bit over enthusiastic." He explained.

Harry was soon let out of the hospital and Madam Pomfrey told him not to push himself and to play safely.


	4. Chapter 4

Harry made his way to the great hall and sat down, some of the Griffindor and Hufflepuff first years were sitting there due to a problem with Mr. Lockhart's classroom. Harry sat down near the end of the Griffindor tables. Ginny noticed him and stood up, ignoring her friends and moving over to where Harry was seated. She sat down across from him, shuffling until she found a comfortable position. She began to play with her hair, bringing it down in front of her face so it would cover her eyes. "Are you feeling better Harry?" she asked nervously. She began to fiddle around with her bag, "You … you know… harry" she stumbled over her words. She grabbed a book from her bag and held it tight to her chest suddenly getting courage. "You've really got a knack for getting into trouble and my Mother always said that boys need a women to keep them in line… I guess what I'm trying to say is" She managed "HARRY I LOVE YOU! Please go out with me!" Harry gapped. He didn't know what to say, he'd seen how Ginny looked at him but never in a million years would he have suspected this, this is ridiculous. Ginny's confidence drained and her face began to get red.

Harry began to calm down, though he knew that his face was now red too, he leaned over and whispered something in Ginny's ear. Ginny looked shocked, and flashes of fear, apprehension and betrayal phased across her face. Finally she stood up, tears streaming down her face as she clutched the book tighter running from the great hall, without looking behind her. Her friends from down the table glared at Harry before rushing off to find their crushed peer. Harry turned so he was straddling the bench and fell back, wincing as he felt his head hit the hard and sturdy wood. He stared up at the charmed roof watching the black clouds roll in. He felt the presence of a storm and not the one outside but rather the one that was bound to happen as soon as Ron heard about this incident. He closed his eyes as a tear ran down the side of his face, he wondered why life had dealt him all the hard cards.

That night Harry went into the common room to find an ambush waiting for him. Ron stood their looking rather peeved and Hermione was sitting their reading a book, looking like she would rather be anywhere else. She obviously didn't want to be present for whatever was about to occur and thought that whatever Ron was going to say was a horrible idea. Harry turned to walk out, hoping he could stall this talk for some time when he was better prepared. Ron's hand on his shoulder stopped him. Harry turned around, giving Ron his full attention, ready for an ear lashing. "How dare you do that to my sister." He said in a low dangerous voice, "She loves you, and she'd do anything for you." He continued pulling Harry deeper into the common room. "You embarrassed her, and I want to know what you told her. She has been crying in the bathroom all day, she won't even come out to see me." He spat. "I tell you Harry, you don't know what you've turned down. She is a brilliant girl, and you'd better go to that washroom and apologize. Beg her to go out with you. I thought you were a decent guy. I thought you'd see just how amazing she is, but now I see you'll need a little pushing. You had better go to my sister or you'll be losing the first friend you've ever made." He said grabbing Harry's robe tightly in his fist. He leaned his face close to Harry so close he could feel his breath on his cheek. Ron appeared to be waiting for a response and when none came, he wound back his arm and punched Harry in the face. When Harry just stumbled back a step, Ron made to strike him again. Stopping just short of Harry, his mouth falling open and his eyes filled with shock.

Harry just stood there as he heard the voice of the youngest Weasley yell "Don't you hit him again! I can stand up for myself, RON!" she spat the name disgusted. "If you force him to go out with me, it means NOTHING! You're despicable."

It was Halloween, and Hermione and Ron were sitting in the Great Hall, Ron snacking on some of the candies, making a point not to look at his ex-best friend. Harry and Hermione were sitting in the awkward silence. Ron hadn't talked to Harry since they had had the fight and his sister hadn't talked to either of them. She'd spent most of her time hiding off somewhere only coming out for classes and meals. Harry didn't like it; he didn't like it even more because he had been hearing voices coming from all around talking about murder, torture and terrible things.

After Harry had eaten, he left the hall early, not caring about any of the festivities that were happening. He hated Halloween, bad things always happened. He performed more accidental magic on Halloween than he normally had in any other month. This only led to more beatings because of his "freakishness". Then there was the feeling he always got, like he was being watched, like someone else was there with him, seeing what he saw and experiencing what he experienced. Harry didn't like it.

Harry began rooming the halls of Hogwarts looking for a quiet place to sit and think. He was deep into the dungeons before he found a suitable place. It was covered in dust, meaning students and cleaning staff alike didn't traverse here very often. He sat on a ledge at the wall, looking out the window. He admired the beautiful scene and couldn't help but wonder if it was actually a real window or something charmed to look like a real window. . However from where he was there was really no way to tell which of the two it might be, so Harry just enjoyed it because it was something to amazing either way. He knew that he couldn't really see the true beauty of the scene due to the fact that his sight was dark and slightly blurry due to an overuse today, despite the new spells Dumbledore had added to make them more magically efficient. By the time Harry decided it was time to head back to the common room it was well past curfew. As he was walking back he began to hear the voices again, coming from the walls he began to run, and continued running until something caught his eye. There sitting in the middle of the hallway was Mrs. Norris the cat.

She was staring at a suit of armour, her mouth hanging open as if she was meowing at something or someone. She was stone still, as if frozen in time. Harry looked towards the suit, seeing a hand curled around the far arm of the medieval decorations. He began to move towards the armour with his wand out he said "Alohomora" moving closer to see the bright red short hair of the youngest Weasley boy.

"What are you doing Potter" said a voice from behind him. Harry turned around to see Professor Snape standing behind him. "You're out past curfew. And who's that there? Mr. Ron Weasley." Snape drawled grabbing Harry's shoulder and dragging him toward the young redhead. Snape grabbed the other boys shoulder and stopped in surprise, looking at the boy. He then saw the cat frozen on the floor. "Stay there" the professor said sternly before rushing off. It wasn't too long before he arrived back with the grandfatherly old headmaster and Madam Pomfrey.

"Harry, my boy, I think it's time that you go back to your dorm. Professor Snape will lead you there." The old man said looking at Harry through his gold spectacles. Snape glared at Harry and then at Dumbledore, before turning around and stalking off in the direction of the Griffindor Common room.

Over the next couple of days rumours started spreading about Harry, being caught on the scene, wand out and pointed at one of the victims doesn't really sound very good and Snape wasn't afraid to tell anyone who asked about the incident. Harry tried to defend himself, telling them about the voices, but this only made things worse. Now it was time for defense and Harry's foul mood was only getting worse. Lockhart began once again bragging about his brilliant duelling abilities and it was getting on Harrys nerves. "If he's such a great duellist, why doesn't he stop bragging and start teaching us duelling. That is part of his job right? Teaching us defense." Harry said quietly to nobody.

Lockhart stopped his speaking and looked directly at Harry, pausing for a moment. "Is that what you want to do? Learn how to duel?" looking over the students he saw an overwhelming amount of nodding. Students are always willing to learn how to duel and especially when there was someone running around petrifying people.

The next day he announced that they were starting up a defense club. Professor Snape will also we participating, Harry thought that that might be because Headmaster Dumbledore wanted Snape to keep Professor Lockhart and the other students in line.

"Gather round! Gather Around, now can everybody see me? Can everybody hear me? Excellent" said the blonde teacher climbing onto and pacing along the long table in the centre of the room. "In light of the dark events of the last week, Professor Dumbledore has granted me permission to start this little duelling club. To train you all up in case you need to defend yourselves, as I have done on countless occasions. For full details, see my published works." He said throwing his cape out into the audience; several girls lunged for it and the one who successful looked as if she had won some grand prize. "Now, let me introduce my assistant, Professor Snape." Everyone looked to see the dark teacher climb up onto the table elegantly but without the same foolish flourish that Lockhart had perfected. "Now he has sportingly agreed to help me with a little demonstration. Now I don't want any of you youngsters to worry, you'll still have your potions Professor when I'm through with him." He said pointing to crowd, "Never fear" he said gently and charmingly, drawing his wand with great flourish.

The two teachers faced each other, bowing before turning away, "One, Two, Three" Mr. Lockhart said to start the duel.

In mere moments the DADA teacher was on his back after Professor Snape shouted a quick "Expelliarmus".

Professor Lockhart got up, and started walking briskly back to where Professor Snape was standing. "An excellent idea to show them that Professor Snape, but if you don't mind me saying, It was pretty obvious. Ah, what you were about to do, and if I had wanted to stop you, it would have been only too easy." Lockhart said easily in a bragging tone.

"Perhaps it would be prudent to show students how to _first_ block unfriendly spells, Professor." The potions master drawled, completely unimpressed.

"An excellent suggestion, Professor Snape! Ah, let's have a volunteer pair, ah… Potter! Neville!" Lockhart called.

"Neville has shown incompetence with even the easiest of spells. May I suggest someone from my own house, Malfoy perhaps?" Snape said swirling around pointing to Malfoy and gesturing him up before leaving the table as Neville's bright red face fell.

The two boys stood in the center of the table before bowing and taking their steps back. "Now, on the count of three, I want you to cast your charms to disarm your opponent - _only_ to disarm. We don't want any accidents here. One, two"

"Everte Statum!" Malfoy shouted, not waiting for the three count. The spell hit harry and he flew backwards into the air.

Harry rose from the floor and pointed his wand at the form of Malfoy shouting his own spell "Rictusempra" his voice boomed.

This time it was Malfoys turn to fly through the air. He fell on his butt and looked up at the dark potions master, who scowled and dragged his Godson to his feet, forcefully turning him around to meet his opponent.

Malfoy glared at Harry as though he had been the one dragging him to his feet. A dark look loomed in Draco's eyes as he said "Serpensortia!", a snake flew out of his wand and started slithering towards Harry.

"Don't move, Potter, I'll get rid of it for you." said professor Snape taking quick deliberate glides towards the snake.

"Allow me, Professor Snape! Alarte Ascendere!" Lockhart said as he pointed his wand at the snake. The snake raised high into the air before dropping it uninjured but annoyed back onto the table.

The snake hissed at those surrounding it, looking around. Harry took a step forward hissing back at the snake. The rest of the room stood stone still as Harry continued to communicate with the snake as it edged closer to one of the students. It looked almost like it was going to attack before Professor Snape snapped out of it and burned the snake to ashes.

The room remained silent, everyone staring trying to explain what had just occurred before their eyes. Suddenly someone managed a "Parseltongue", of course it had been Professor Lockhart. With this the room filled with whispers about "The Dark Prince", "Heir of Slytherin", and "The Chamber of Secrets". Snape stalked forward grabbing Harry's fist without seeming to look at him, dragging him down the long table and down the steps transfigured at the end of them. He kept dragging Harry towards the Dungeons, ignoring all demands for an explanation and destination. They reached a portrait of Salazar Slytherin and Snape cast a quick spell preventing Harry from hearing the password. The portrait gave both the potions professor and Harry a weird look before opening the door as Snape released the spell. Harry was dragged to the couch before being ungraciously thrown onto it. Falling into it, Harry had the wind knocked out of him. He sat there for a second trying to regain it, noticing the youngest potions master pace back and forth like a caged and feral animal. Harry had the feeling interrupting his thoughts would be dangerous and sat in silence. So instead he looked around the room, seeing the small chamber decorated in calming greens, pale silvers along with earthy browns and some blacks. There weren't many furnishings inside the room and there were only three doors, the one they had just entered from and two more. One of them was left open a crack and through it Harry could see what appeared to be a bathroom. The other must be Snape's bedroom. Besides the couch he was sitting on there was another chair, behind a desk with piles of papers, a bookshelf, and a fireplace which at the moment was mostly embers. The embers burned brightly and the wood crackled and sparked, none of the burning pieces leaving the fireplace. Harry watched one of them fly like it was going to land on the dark green carpet outside the fireplace and wondered as it seemed be blown back in by some invisible spell. Harry saw the room darken slightly as the charmed amulet went into a power saver sort of mode detecting that the room didn't have as much magic floating around as the rest of the castle. Snape must avoid doing magic in his chambers and there was a possibility that the fireplace spell was the only active one in the room.

"You just live to make my life difficult, don't you Potter?" beginning with a spiteful tone, but sinking into sad resignation.

"Ummm…" Harry started quietly "What did I do?" stopping his pacing Snape stopped to look at him angrily as if he was an idiot for not realizing.

Snape sighed looking away towards an empty fishbowl peculiarly placed as a centerpiece on the bookshelf; he stared at it intensely as if willing it to do something. "You're a Parselmouth Harry; the ability to speak to snakes is a rare and misunderstood gift. It's passed through bloodlines, and since it certainly didn't come from the Potter bloodline, it must have come from your mothers, meaning rather than a mud… muggleborn, she must have come from a long line of squibs." He said, the look in his eyes only getting more intense. "Unfortunately this information will soon reach the whole school and therefore the parents of all these silly children. Most of them will be able to put the 'Heir of Slytherin' together with the recent petrification and deduce that the Chamber of Secrets is open. This leaves you to be the obvious culprit for the recent crime. Harry you have just put yourself in a very difficult position. Harry there is only one other person known to be a Parseltongue, and that is '_He-Who-Must_-_Not-Be-Named_'. " Snape looked him in the eyes and as soon as their gazes connected a pained look crossed Snape's face for a mere moment.

Harry had already guessed that being a Parselmouth wasn't as common as he had hoped. Just another thing to add to the list of freakish things about him, and of course the only other one known to share this talent had to be the freaking Dark Lord. Life was just out to get him, Harry sat back on the couch leaning his head against the back of it looking up at the ceiling which was uncharmed and unremarkable, trying to blink back tears of frustration. Now he was the top suspect for the petrification's, as if arriving on the scene first wasn't enough to peg him as the culprit.

Snape shifted uncomfortably, obviously seeing his frustration and tears, as if arguing as to whether or not to taunt or comfort. "Harry, you should probably head to your dorms, you shouldn't add breaking curfew again to your list of mischief." Snape said, smoothly and confidently. Harry looked at the clock, he still had 3 hours to get back before curfew. Even if he got lost in the dungeons, he would still have tonnes of time to get back to the common room before bed. Even so, he left, understanding that Snape was not comfortable with a Lion crying inside what Harry had deduced must have been his chambers. He left quickly without a word refusing to acknowledge the tears sliding down his cheeks until he had left Snape's chambers and found that the hallway outside them was clear. Wiping them with the sleeve of his robe he started walking to the common rooms. He was careful to take hallways that were less used by students, both for travel and snogging. Harry was thankful when he only ran across a couple of students in the hallways. He spoke the password to the Fat Lady and made his way into the common room. Harry walked into the loud and rambunctious room, noticing silence creep upon the students wearing red and gold as Harry pushed his way through them. They began to move out of his way and suddenly Harry felt very alone. As he pass through the last of the crowd, he turned back to look at his fellow housemates noticing their cold scared stares. Harry turned from the crowd and walked up the stairs to his dorm room. Collapsing on his bed he heard the noises in the common room return to normal and Harry ignored the new hot tears.

Harry was walking down the halls of Hogwarts, alone, with Ron petrified and Hermione spending all of her time ignoring Harry and looking up petrification in the library Harry had been alone a lot. He saw Luna Lovegood, one of the few not afraid of him and waved at her. She was wearing two mismatching socks and shoes. The strange thing was the sock on the right foot matched the shoe on the left and visa-versa. She nodded back, giving him a generous smile. She looked slightly blurry because he hadn't let his magic amulet charge as much as he should have over the past couple of days and the charge was beginning to run out. She continued skipping buy carrying her books upside-down and humming a song that sounded very much like "Humpty Dumpty".

"Loony Lovegood now? What is that now 3? Luna, Hermione and who was it… Ginny? Got yourself quiet a little harem there don't you Potter?" Alone wasn't quite the right word. Malfoy and his goonies had been following him ever since he'd got a letter back from his father. He was the main suspect for being the Heir of Slytherin, a title claimed by the culprit. "The Heir of Slytherin returns, the Chamber of Secrets reopened." Over one of the latest victims, there were now 5 in the hospital wing, not including Mrs. Norris.

"Why, no one's safe from your charms, eh Potter? A crazy, a mudblood bookworm, and a blood traitorous redhead, wow potter, you sure know how to pick them. They're all crazy for you, yet I bet none of them will even let you go near them. What's the saying? Water, water everywhere, but not a drop to drink? I bet you've never even touched a woman. I bet little Potty here won't ever get laid. Seems they'll go for anyone these days. Even Orphans, halfbloods, people with horrible facial disfigurement, and oh yeah, MURDERERS. " Malfoy said.

"Shut up!" Harry shouted a Draco.

"What's wrong? Don't like us picking on your girlfriends?" Malfoy teased.

"SHUT… UP! I don't like them that way…" Harry said.

"Or is it that since your dear dead mommy was killed when you were a baby you don't know how to interact with women and now you'r…"

"I'm GAY! Yes! I'm GAY, Malfoy. Now LAY OFF!" Harry shouted, he then stormed away from Malfoy along the dark and long hallway. Malfoy now had this shocked and disgusted look on his face as if he'd just stepped in a hot steamy load of hippogriff dung.


	5. Chapter 5

Hihi! I have decided to take up NaNoWriMo! I will be attempting to write 50000 words this month! That's more than 1666 a day! ^^ I probably won't succeed, but it does mean that you get a lot more chapters as I try… (I'm already almost 11000 words behind.)

Harry walked into the great hall, noticing the looks coming from his schoolmates. The boys and girls both had mixed reactions to this new news. The girls looked at him with pity, as if being gay instantly declared him innocent and framed. The boys still looked at him with fear, and anger. The boys in his dorm looked more fearful than others, as if he was going to, or already had raped them in their sleep. This had interestingly enough split the Gryffindor table into two parts, male and female. As he moved down the table he saw several girls make room for him and sat in-between them. The two girls, who he didn't recognize gave him a smile, but remained silent. He looked around the quiet female section of the table for Hermione and found her sitting just at the end of the girls section of the table, taking with some of the first year guys, who were just barely on their side as well. Sighing he tried to ignore the pain welling up inside him. He began to fill his plate with generous helpings of sugary breakfast foods, being generous with the syrup on his pancakes trying to ignore his situation by giving his sweet tooth it's fill for a lifetime. Just as he was about to dig in he felt someone tapping him on his shoulder. Ginny Weasley, clutching a black leather book tightly to her chest, she looked as if conflicted, but pity quickly painted over the conflicted look like a flood. She handed him the book, saying "Here, you need it more than I do." the pale look on her face said that giving up the book was a struggle and that he'd better take it before she changed her mind.

Harry took the book, realizing it had been the one she had constantly been carrying around all year, not letting it out of her sight or grasp. He took the book carefully and watched as a pained expression crossed Ginny's face and she walked out of the great hall. Looking down at the book, he feels a tingle in his fingers, the book is letting off some kind of magic. He quickly finishes eating, careful not to drip or drop anything onto the book on his lap. He was anxious to get back to his room and find out why this book was so special. Why the young girl hadn't let it out of her sight and why he could practically feel it humming on his lap as he ate. Finishing off his pumpkin juice he hurried out of the great hall and towards his dorm. Once in his dorm room he sat down on the bed and drew the curtain around it for some privacy. After all who knows what could be in this book. Opening it up he was disappointed to find that it was completely blank. He flipped through all the pages to make triple sure. Why would a book so thriving with magic be empty? Maybe you have to complete a ritual to see it? Or it can only be read under the light of the full moon or something magical like that? He knew that magic often had weird conditions like that. He placed the book under his pillow and began to prepare for his next class. He would figure out what to do about the book later.

He slept with the pillow under his pillow that night, deciding to wait the 2 days for the full moon and try that, maybe read up on magical books in the library. The next day Harry brought it to his classes, and instead of feeling awkward under his classmates stared he found himself daydreaming, wondering what was in the book and what he would do with it. He had increasing desires to write in the book, but that might ruin it, cover over some secret powerful spell or something.

The full moon was a long time in arriving but once it had Harry found a secluded area of the castle with something he had determined to be a real window which would let in the real light of the moon, just in case.

Sitting in the light from the moon Harry carefully and slowly opened the book, as if the words hidden inside might be scared away if he opened it too quickly.

Harry peered at the pages, letting out a sigh he didn't know he'd been holding. The pages were again blank and harry wondered if his blindness prevented him from seeing it, or if the amulet wasn't capable of picking up the magic that showed the words or if it was indeed blank and just a diary or something. Harry let his vision fade, lost in his own thoughts and disappointment.

Harry was suddenly pulled from his sulking as he felt the book hum. A flicker caught his attention and he saw words being written on the pages of the book. "Hello, my name is Tom." The letters were written elegantly across the page almost artistically. "And who is it that Ginny has presented me to?"

Harry sat there dumbfounded. "Hello, I'm Harry" he wrote, his writing sitting on the page, mockingly rough and messy beside tom's script. He looked at the two different writing styles embarrassed as he compared them. The words began to fade away and Harry watched with amazement.

"Harry, as in Harry Potter, The-boy-Ginny's-obsessed-with? The boy-who-lived?" the journal asked.

Harry wrote down a quick "yes". He hated the title, the-boy-who-lived. It was silly to be famous for his parents deaths and his own survival. He had been a baby at the time there is no way he could have killed the Dark Lord. It just wasn't possible. Also there were many other children who had lost their parents, or whose families had been wiped out completely by the war.

The book remained still for a while before the book responded to the answer, even though Harry was sure the book already knew his identity before it had formed the question on the page. It's silence must be calculating or else a rejection in some way. Harry wouldn't be surprised if it was the latter. He had always known he was a freak. He never realized how much of a freak he was until he got to the wizarding world. He was a freak among freaks. "It's nice to meet you. I am Tom, Tom Riddle." The book responded however, in that neat, polite and somehow guarded script. Harry didn't know how letters on the page could look guarded but somehow this book had managed to achieve it.

"Nice to meet you too" Harry responded to the journal.

Snape was up working on marking some of the essays he had gotten his third year classes to write, when his arm started to itch. Ignoring the irritation he continued to mark the essays hoping to finish before midnight so he could get up early and work on some of the potions he had in a stasis. He caught himself scratching his arm as he marked a particularly horrid essay with poor penmanship and looked like it had been thrown together last minute. The content, once he had deciphered it also helped support his theory because the writer obviously had no concept of what he was rambling about. Three essays later the itch in his arm had developed into a dull throbbing. Only when the throbbing started to become painful did he take notice. He pulled up his sleeve revealing his dark mark hidden beneath it. Snape, unlike most deatheaters was not stupid enough to just let the mark be since he had to pull up his sleeves on many occasions while making potions or attempting to prevent an explosion due to some childs folly or ignorance. He had long ago found muggle makeup was more than able to cover the mark so it looked as though it was not even there. For this reason Snape was surprised that when he pulled up his sleeve he could actually see the dark mark, though it was still covered up in makeup the area was red swollen and angry looking. Snape let out a hiss and immediately rushed to the fireplace, flooing to the Malfoy Manor. There were somethings that he knew he could trust the Malfoy with and many things he knew he could not. Once arriving at the manor he knew a house elf would be on it's way to tell Lucius that he had guest waiting in the hall for him. Lucius arrived a few minutes later, clearly annoyed that he had been disturbed by the stupid little elf. He looked as the potions master and a worried expression swept over his face, and then as quickly as it arrived it was gone. "What's wrong?" he asked "Is something wrong with Draco?" The wizard asked in a Malfoy like tone, careful not to let his emotions show through the mask again.

"No, Malfoy is not hurt or in any trouble, I'm here for a personal reason, is there anywhere we can talk?" Snape drawled.

Malfoy picked up on the not too subtle hint and took him to his personal study, warded to be completely safe from eavesdroppers. Even the elves could not get into this room without his permission, and even then he had to be there to supervise.

Once they arrived and the door was closed the potions professor wasted no time in rolling up his sleeve and showing the pure-blooded wizard the angry mark, banishing the muggle makeup away. His arm had swollen around the mark, and the mark itself was hot to the touch. The snake on the mark squirmed around as if restless and as though it could feel the heat it itself was producing.

Lucius looked taken aback and made a move to grab his own mark sympathetically. Snape knew that the head of the Malfoy house didn't have the same condition the second that he asked if his son was okay. If he had been in the same situation he would have known exactly why the potions master and old friend had shown up at his house unannounced. "I've never seen anything like that." Lucius said coolly. Snape knew that the man was afraid. The mark had not been active since the night of the Dark Lords death, when all the deatheaters felt the dark magic drain from their marks. If the dark marks were becoming active again that meant that their Lord was returning and they would have to be held accountable for their actions. Snape doubted that any of the Deatheaters would like that; he also doubted that the Dark Lord had mellowed with his deaths.

The Head of the Malfoy Bloodline seemed to realize this as well for he began to pale, staring off in the direction of Hogwarts. "Well if it suits you, I think we both have a lot to think about, and I have a pile of third year essays to mark. I will be heading back, take care of yourself Lucius." Snape said coldly and slowly careful not to show the worry that they both were feeling and knew it. This can only mean trouble, and the fact that neither of them had been called to an inner circle meeting could only mean that something was brewing. Even if the Dark Lord never trusted his inner circle with very much he would still call them to give them tasks to do to continue his plans even if he didn't tell them how they would do so. Most thought that the inner circlewere the ones that the Dark Lord trusted the most, but the Dark Lord didn't trust anyone. The inner circle were just the people he had decided were the least likely to fail him in the tasks he assigned to them. There were many more loyal followers than Malfoy and Snape and the Dark Lord was not blind to that; however Malfoy with his riches and contacts, and the potions master and head of the Slytherin house were two powerful pawns and needed to be kept close.

Snape continued to think over the situation as he stalked back to the floo. Once he arrived back at his office in the dungeons he walked over to his desk and pulled out a flask of fire whiskey. It was going to be a long night.


	6. Chapter 6

"_Nice to meet you too." Harry said._

"Mr. Potter, would you mind talking with me about what happened _that_ night? That is, of course, if it's not too much of a bother" Tom wrote.

Harry sighed looking at the book. It was a common question and he'd answered it more than a couple of times, he'd answered the question at least four times to just Ron alone. He answered the same thing he answered every time.

"Just call me Harry. Well, I don't really remember anything really. The only thing I might remember is... well sometimes I hear a woman calling my name and seeing a flash of green light. In my dreams that is, or more accurately nightmares. All I really know is that the Voldemort came after my family tried to kill me, but somehow failed." Harry finished.

It almost felt like the book sighed. Weather from relief or exasperation, Harry didn't know. "So that's all they've told you? Do you know why… Voldemort came after your parents? Why you survived? And you may call me Tom if you wish."

Harry hesitated "Okay Tom, I'm not really sure. I think he came after us because my parents wouldn't join the Dark Lord. I guess…" harry sprawled his script across the page.

"No, I'm going to tell you the truth about your parents Harry. You've probably been told that you are the savior of the Light and the wizarding world. However I ask you, what kind of people would send their saviour to live with muggles? To be untrained when there is a possibility of a revival of the Dark Lord or a new one sprouting up?" Tom let the words linger on the page before he continued, letting Harry mull over the questions before continuing.

"The truth is that you are not a light wizard. You are a dark wizard, Harry. I can tell just from sampling your magic. You are very strong Harry, as strong as Dumbledore easily and possibly even as strong as the Voldemort himself. That's something very impressive for a young boy who hasn't even hit magical maturity yet." At this Harry shook his head. There was no way THAT was possible.

Dumbledore was a very powerful wizard, more famous than even the-boy-who-lived. He had defeated a Dark Lord in an actual battle, not just out of pure luck as a baby in a crib. Dumbledore just attracted others to him. He was always so confident and sure about whatever he did. Dumbledore never showed and doubt. Guilt, yes, but never doubt.

Also, his parents were both light wizards, or so he'd been told. They were supporters of Dumbledore, his mother a muggleborn, his father a pureblood. The teenage dream of love at first sight, and completely inseparable in all that they did.

"Your mother was not a muggleborn like everyone thinks. She was actually a pureblood and so are you. She was actually a very strong supporter of the Dark Arts and the Dark Lord during her years at Hogwarts. Something happened though, right before she graduated. She betrayed the Dark Lord, telling Dumbledore about Voldemort and marrying one James Potter. The only one who seemed to know what happened is Severus Snape. But that was the reason that _he_ went after your parents Harry."

Harry was obviously shocked. How did the book know this? How could it be true? He was a Dark pureblood? He had a point though, why had they left him in that hell whole? The Dursleys were not the sort you left any child with, never mind a magical 'savior'.

They were abusive to both Harry and their own son, if in completely different ways. Harry was never given any favours or even many necessities. He was only given what it took to survive and in public what it took to appear normal. Dudley was just the opposite, they showed him how to be a bully, and argued when any teacher gave him a less than perfect mark insisting that he was perfect. They also overfed him and gave him whatever he wanted which is what lead to his obesity. If they kept up this way he doubted that Dudley would make 40.

Would it really have been that hard to find him someone else to adopt him? He doubted it would have taken very much to get his aunt and uncle to sign the papers so that they would not have to deal with him. And then there was the whole training idea. Dumbledore didn't seem that surprized to know that Voldemort had come back and came after the philosopher's stone.

Wouldn't you train the Boy-who-lived? So that he could live again and defeat again? Why would you leave such an asset untrained? Why would you bring something so important into a school full of children anyway? Why were the tests so easy to pass that three FIRST years were able to pass them without any real help? How had Dumbledore not known that Voldemort was sharing the body of Quirrell when he was supposed to be a Legilimency master? Wouldn't he have started trying to figure out what was happening and who was doing it after the broom incident?

There were more thoughts going through Harry's head than he had room for and he had a headache that seemed well on it's way to a migraine. Harry saw his vision begin to fade as the amulet went into a magic saver mode and everything got much darker. He looked down at the book, seeing nothing new written on the pages, he wrote "My amulet is beginning to loose it's power, I need to go. When can I talk to you again?" Harry asked afraid he would have to wait for the next full moon before he could speak to Tom again. He didn't know why but he trusted Tom and felt like he could trust him with anything.

"You can talk to me whenever you want. I'll still be here." Tom said. "But I'd suggest that you not talk to me in front of your friends." Tom suggested, unknowingly sending a pain through Harrys chest as he remembered that his friends had deserted him.

"Okay" Harry stated "Talk to you later then." Then shutting the book he began to head back to his dorm, hoping that all his dorm mates were asleep.

Over the next couple of days Harry began to talk to Tom at every opportunity. It was nice to have someone he could trust and who wouldn't share his secrets. It was invigorating. He began to bring it with him to classes and realized he felt more comfortable when the book was in his arms.

He began to watch his potions professor closely. If Tom was write than he had been very close to his mother when they had both been in school together. They had apparently grown up in the same neighborhood even as children.

As the days progressed he saw his potions professor grown antsier. As if some unknown pressure was crushing him, or some horrible prophecy was hanging over his head, threating to occur at any moment. The bags under his eyes slowly got bigger and his flourishing entrance began to lose some of its fearsome appearance.

But Snape wasn't the only one that Harry began to watch closely. He began to watch his beloved headmaster more as well. This wasn't very fruitful. Harry watched the headmaster and debated with himself. How could this grandfatherly old man be scheming or conniving in anyway?

Without the headmaster, he felt like he would still be in the closet under the stairs bruised broken and starving to death agonizingly slowly. He was always so kind and slightly senile as well. His robes screamed crazy old man, not Light Lord as Harry had come to think of him. After all someone so powerful and so opposed to the Dark Arts not be the Light Lord?

Watching him closely it was easy to see that most people believed in his grandfatherly persona, the Slytherins let down their guards around him just as easily as the rest. The most hardened Slytherins smiled like the rest when he caught them in his gaze even if the smile was slightly guarded. Teachers as well were no acceptation to this either. Most of the teachers would smile like the rest looking like a young child yearning for their elders acceptance.

Snape seemed to be the only one who didn't melt like butter when the grandfatherly old man smiled at him. For some reason though he seemed like he was the only one, and Harry couldn't help but realize how much control the headmaster had over Hogwarts as Harry caught himself smiling as the headmaster fixed in his gaze. He couldn't help it when the headmasters blue twinkling eyes shone at you from behind those golden half-moon specs.

Another thing he had notices was a lack of petrified children, they had stopped finding people in the halls frozen in place like strangely lifelike statues. Things were heading back to normalcy, not that the boys had gone back to normal.

They were still very uncomfortable around him, but when they didn't notice him they weren't looking around like they expected to be the next victim. Another step forward was the fact that even when they did notice them they stopped staring at him, expecting him to try to jump their bones right then and there. They decided that it was best to just ignore him for now.

This suited Harry very well and was much closer to what he wanted when he came to Hogwarts. Not all this fame. He didn't want to be famous or adored, but he didn't want to be hated either. He wanted to be able to fade into the background for once, and for once this is actually what happened. No more admirers, stalkers, bullying, or constant attention, just peace and quiet.

Harry was sitting in the back of his History class as was now his habit with all of his classes, he was talking to Tom about some of the more interesting and important parts of wizarding history instead of the boring and useless facts that his teacher decided to teach in the course. "Tom?" Harry wrote "What are the Dark Arts exactly?"

Tom paused before answering. "The Dark magic is just a branch of magic that response better to magicians with dark magic. The term 'dark' just refers to the feel of magic emanating from the user. Light is warm and comforting, Dark is possessive and encircling. Light arts are usually healing or defensive while Dark arts are usually offensive and binding." He explained

"Spells like the patronus are used to defend and considered light, but have also been used to trap victims in with dementors which can easily cause more damage than a Cruciatus Curse. Likewise, Serpensortia is usually used to summon a snake to poison an enemy and considered dark, but also has been used to summon snakes for their venom in things like anti-venoms and healing potions. Even the Avada Kedavara though it kills is a lot quicker and less painful than many light spells that can be used to kill an opponent. The last reason that the Dark arts are considered dark is because using them gives the caster a rush and can be very addictive. Many dark wizards end up losing themselves to their magic and would do anything for that next high." Riddle finished his lecture.

"Oh" the boy-who-lived said simply.

"Are you still interested in the Dark Arts?" Tom asked.

"My mom supported the Dark Arts right?" Harry asked even though he already knew the answer and knew Tom knew his answer.

"She was." He wrote. "After it gets dark there is something I would like to show you, if you will let me. Make sure you have enough charge in your amulet, you'll need it."

Snape woke up in his bedroom to an alarm from his floo telling him someone was fire-calling him. Snape got up quickly heading over to the floo, hoping it wasn't some foolish child who injured himself and needed a potion brewed immediately. He hurried over to find Lucius in his fireplace. He looked down at the man, the man looked like a mess. "I'm on my way." Snape said quickly.

Once through the floo, which lead directly to the Purebloods private quarters, Snape realized that they weren't alone. There were several others from the ranks of the Death eaters. They were all the ones located the closest to the Hogwarts castle. With the acceptation of Lucius who lived rather farther away. "It's spread hasn't it?" the potions master asked.

There were several nods as a few looked away as if ashamed of some unknown disease that they had contracted. A few of them rolled up their sleeves to show marks in various stages. Snape rolled up his own sleeve, showing a mark more angry and red than the rest. At this Lucius's eyes widened as he saw the mark and rolled up his own sleeve, at this the rest of them bared their arms.

These ones rolled up their sleeves and instead of finding painful and festering looking mark; there was a plain mark, but not plain. Upon closer inspection the marks looked more alive and active. The scales shone brighter, the tongues looked pinker, the fangs whiter and sharper. Like the mark had the colours redone… or like the magic that had drained_ that_ night was returned.

"My mark started acting up shortly after you visited me." Lucius said. "It took just short of twenty-four hours before it looked like this." He said gesturing to the more lifelike marks in the room.

"Yours has been like that for longer than any of us, and from as far as any of us can tell you were the first one to get it…" one of the younger and newer recruits said. He'd been recruited just before the Dark Lord's demise. "Has _HE_ contacted you?"

Snape shook his head but replied "No but this must mean he is located in Hogwarts, and gaining power quickly. You should all be ready for a summon. Unless I miss my mark, it won't be too much longer now." The room looked somber. They had figured out this much for themselves, but it didn't mean that they had to like it.

That night Harry snuck out of his dorms, tom's book in his hands, he wandered down until he reached a light so that he could read the book without straining his amulet. Opening the book he saw the directions already neatly written there waiting for him. He made his way to the second floor, and the found the directions leading him to the second floor girls bathroom. "Tom?" he wrote.

"I know, just head in quickly." Tom said before he could write anything else.

Harry listened closing the book and walked inside the girls room. He didn't like the thought of being in here, but then again going into the boys room lead to uncomfortable situations too. He couldn't win. He noticed that this washroom, though clean, didn't look like it was used very often. He was about to open the book to figure why Tom had taken him to the here when a ghost floated out of one of the stall. She moaned and looked at him. She giggled.

Harry looked at the strange ghost, who looked like she had been a Hogwarts student while she had been alive. "Who is this cute boy who wanders into Moaning Myrtles washrooms?" she asked giving him a look over.

"And who is moaning Myrtle?" Harry asked. The ghost curtsied to let him know that he was in fact talking to moaning Myrtle.

"You're a lot nicer than the other guests I've been getting, people looking for somewhere to gossip or get away from their other schoolmates. Nobody loves moaning Myrtle. Everyone ignores me." She said floating around, sinking back into a moaning sob while floating circles around harry. "This one girl she doesn't even look at me! She just walks in and says something like 'a_pen_' and just disappears! Nobody's very nice to me. Everyone hates me." The ghost continued.

"_Open?_" Harry asked the ghost. The ghost squealed excitedly and nodded. This girl was bi-polar he decided. She was staring behind him at the sinks with a nervous excitement. The Harry turned around and found that where the sinks used to be there was now something that looked like a pipe. Harry moved closer to peer down it. He stood right near the edge and looked down. He couldn't see the bottom, but he felt at ease looking down the tunnel. As if a wave of peace had rolled over him.

He was losing himself in the easy feeling when Moaning Myrtle screamed. Harry, startled by the noise jumped a little. If Harry had a little better shoes that had any sort of grip on the bottom, or if the ledge had been a little less slimy it wouldn't have mattered. However since Harry's shoes had no grip and the edge had been disgustingly slimy he slipped and fell down the tunnel. He tried to slow his descent with his hands and feet, but all he managed to do was get more slime on his hand and the book.

Once he got to the bottom he immediately cast a luminous and opened the book. "Are you okay?" he asked his newfound friend Tom.

"I'm just peachy." The writing looked sarcastic, and the slimy green goo began to be absorbed into the book and the damage repaired.

"How'd you get in?" the boy in the book asked.

"I said 'open'" Harry said slightly confused.

"The door is only supposed to open when one says 'open' in Parseltongue!" the words appeared quickly on the book with an incredulous feeling tone.

"I am a Parseltongue." Harry wrote, hoping that this wouldn't make Tom reject him.

"Well, that's both surprising and oddly convenient for me. I am also a Parseltongue and this is where I wanted to bring you. I thought I would have to take control of your body to get us in here, but the fact that you are able to get in here on your own makes things much easier for us." Tom wrote.

Harry read this and was a little shocked to learn that there was another like him, he had been told that Voldemort was the only other one who could talk to snakes like this. It also surprised him to learn that his friend could take control of his body. The scary part was that he didn't know if he had to consent to this or not. Harry decided not to ask, and instead accepting almost too quickly.

"Where are we?" Harry asked.

"We are in the lair of one of the greatest wizards who ever lived. Salazar Slytherin." Tom said reverently. "Welcome to the Chamber of Secrets."

Harry looked around. They were in a dark slimy tunnel and looked much like a muggle sewer. This was not the thing he would have expected to be the Chamber of Secrets or a lair of any of the founding four, never mind the founder of Slytherin. Slytherin was the house of appearance, impressions and deception.

Harry knew that he would get lost if he just went wondering off on his own, especially if it was anything like a sewer so he asked Tom.

"Where to next?" he watched the ink fade into the page.

"With your back facing to the tunnel you just gracefully descended turn right and keep walking. You'll know when you've reached the real chamber." Tom replied on the pale parchment.

Okay so maybe it wasn't as easy to get lost as he'd thought, he followed Tom's directions and found that in fact he DID know when he had reached the real chamber. The tunnel suddenly opened up to a wide room.

The room was magnificent. The walls were carved from a stone that let out a little glow and shone lightly with magic. There was a face carved into the wall, of an old man with hair spreading wildly behind him and a great beard falling to the floor. To either side of the massive room was a set of stairs leading up to several doors.

Unlike the rest of the tunnels this area looked as if the house elves were down here cleaning continuously. There was no slime and thee beautiful pools of water right before the statue looked clean enough to drink, and the fountains one on the left and one on the right looked untouched by age. The statues themselves were beautiful. Both had snakes wrapping around a staff, each pointing towards the center water pouring from their open mouths. On top of the staffs were carvings of the sun and the moon, sun on the right and the moon on the left.

While one would have expected these to be equal in height they were not, the staff holding up the moon was significantly higher than the one with the sun carving. Harry could only guess that these were charmed to move to tell the time.

"I'm pretty sure I've found it." The young Griffindor wrote in the small black journal.

"Good." Tom said. "Toss my book in the water in-between the two staffs" He commanded.

Harry complied shutting the book and threw the book in the water. The water began to glow and the pages flipped open to somewhere near the middle, probably the exact middle knowing how magic works. Floating above the book ripples started to form in the air as a form began to take shape. A very transparent shape, but a shape none the less.

The boy who appeared before him was handsome to say the least, he had short black hair much like his own but instead of an unruly mess, the boy's hair was neat and there wasn't a hair out of place. His face was long and unblemished. He had dark eyes that seemed almost red when they caught the right light, much like someone's hair might, as soon as you spotted the redness though it was gone as if it had never been. The boy was tall and thin, though anyone could tell he had some muscle to him. He was wearing the Hogwarts uniform, Slytherin it seems. They boy didn't look that much older than him, he was probably in his 5th year.

"Tom?" Harry asked as the boy looked over his hand, front and back as if examining it.

The boy nodded taking a step forward, towards solid ground. He kept coming closer to Harry until his foot came over solid floor and he rippled again. Tom took a step back and his fists clenched. He was not strong enough to go over land yet.

Harry still stood there confused. "Harry," Tom said in a cheery tone. "It's a long story, but the short end of it is that during my years at Hogwarts I copied myself and placed it in this book." The black haired boy then gestured to the water surrounding him.

"This water has been sitting in the chambers below Hogwarts ever since this place was created. It has absorbed much of the stray magic as it was designed. After all, you can't have generations of stray magic just floating around a magical school. That would create all kinds of problems. This place is bad enough without enough stray magic to destroy a country floating around, itching to be used." The boy sighed.

"See when I made this book I didn't contemplate just how much magic I would need to regenerate myself. I would need to suck someone dry of magic in order to get a body back." He continued "and that's where you come in."

Harry took a step back his mouth dropping open in shock. His eyes fluttered and he looked ready to cry. Had Tom just led him here to steal his magic? Will you walk into my parlour? Said the spider to the fly, and like the silly fly he'd walked right into the trap. All it had taken was a few nice words, he felt so foolish. He thumbed to the ground staring up at the ceiling in hopelessness.

Tom quickly backtracked "No Harry, you're much too useful for that. I'm talking about that." He said pointing to the pendant around the golden boy's neck.

"With that I can absorb the energies from this water more effectively, and of course I wouldn't have to kill anyone. Mind you that would probably be a lot faster, but still this is the better option. Nobody will even notice, and with this form more… full, I can teach you some Dark Arts. You are interested in learning some right?" the handsome boy played upon his curiosity.

At least it was better than the alternative. "So what does that mean?" the boy asked trying to get a full grasp of the deal that the older boy was suggesting.

"It means that during the day you leave me here with the amulet, returning at night and I will try to teach you some of the more basic of the Dark Arts." The dark eyed boy said.

"But what will I do for my classes? How will I do my work?" Harry asked quietly.

"You'll learn how to operate blind, you can't go on hiding behind that pendant forever. Sure in Hogwarts it's fine, because of all the juvenile magic users who haven't learned how to spell yet, but what about after that? Do you plan to stay here for all your life? Never have a family or get a job? Or do you plan to teach forever? What about retirement?" the older boy asked rhetorically.

Harry knew he was right, he hadn't really learned how to operate blind, the rest of them thought that the summer would have taught him that, but he rarely left his room. The more he stayed out of his family's hair the less likely it was that he would find himself being punished. He'd also been wearing the amulet for most of the school year not adjusting but instead leaning fully on the crutch that the headmaster had given him.

He knew that he would have to get used to it eventually, but that doesn't mean that it didn't scare him. He also knew he was right for another reason, the Dark Lord. If Harry ever had to fight Voldemort again, he wouldn't be merciful. He would try to rip off the amulet to get ahead of Harry, and if he ran out of juice in the middle of a fight, as his luck would likely run, there is no way he could call time until the amulet had charged again. It was a weakness to rely on something like he was, but wasn't he allowed to have a weakness?

Harry let out a laugh. Tom looked at him strangely. "You're right." He said. He tossed the pendant at the diary, it met its mark and landed right between its pages, if the sound was anything to tell by. He started walking back to the entrance.

"Harry! Harry!" Tom called after him, when Harry didn't answer or even turn around to face him Tom then added "It's the third pipe on the left! Say '_stairs_' when you get there! You might find that a bit easier!" he called hopping Harry heard him.

He was trying to avoid the headmaster's attention. The headmaster knew he was back but that was all he needed to know. He would have his hands full for now trying to keep the petrifications out of the press and trying to keep the parents calm. He also knew it would take a while before the parents were sedated since they would not lie down and accept what the headmaster said until all the children had been released from their petrification.

The golden boy was easier to manipulate as he had hoped, almost as easy to manipulate as that silly Weasley. Tom sighed as he thought about it, at least he was out of her pathetic grasp. Harry this, Harry that, it was all she thought about.

It was easy enough to get her to humiliate herself in front of the great hall, but he'd never expected that things would turn out so well on Harry's end as well. He knew that the silly red-headed girl's brother would betray his friend in attempt to save their already soiled family name.

However he had not expected the boy to be gay. It was unusual for anyone to find out their sexual preference this early, or even think about it really, never mind announce it. It had just worked too perfectly; making the girl feel sorry for him was easy, because she already did. The hard part was convincing her to let go of him.

The boy was interesting, and he had known that since he had felt his magic back when the stupid Malfoy had let go of his book and placed it in the young girl's grasp. He had felt his magic from across the room, a powerful spike in magic. He knew that the boy had felt it too, though he probably didn't know it was him that had caused the spike in magic in return. Once he had gotten into the silly Griffindors hands he realized just why his magic had resonated in such a way.

The boy was also a Horcrux. He had no clue how he could have been so foolish. Once he had realized this he spent a good deal of time rifling through the memories stored away in the mark on the boy-who-lived's forehead. With every Horcrux he had become more and more nervous more and more unstable. His motives had changed and his true desires disintegrated. The noble cause he had started with and the twisted selfish cause he had pursued to his first and second deaths had been as north and south and he wasn't even sure how he had gotten so far away from himself.

He could only assume that it was his horcuxes themselves that had done this, that with each piece of his soul he had left he had also lost a big piece of his sanity. It was the only reason he could come up with. How else could he have gotten so corrupt that he would crucio his inner circle for so little as showing up late to a meeting?

He had to reunite them, otherwise when he finally got his body back he would fall back into the same darkness. The only problem was how to reunite them. Horcruxes were meant to be permanent. That was their purpose, to be indestructible. Figuring out how to get his soul fragments back from these objects would be especially hard. Thinking back to the objects he had chosen he realized just how much of a task this would be. The objects he had chosen were ancient and powerful, possessing magic of their own. Morgana only knew what kinds of trouble that would lead too when trying to complete his soul.

Then there was Harry, his most recent and accidental Horcrux. All the objects did have their own magic, but they were not as powerful as Harry, and he somehow doubted it would be as easy to do a ritual on him. 'Hey sit in this magical circle for a minute? Yeah it should only take a couple of hours, oh don't mind the dragon blood… it's nothing. REALLY.' The boy sighed.

He had long since sunk back into his paper prison. It looked comfy inside, but after all this time the comfort had worn off. The room had turned suffocating despite the fond memories of the Slytherin common room.

Most of his times in the common room though, had been spent reading ancient texts stolen from the restricted section, the room of requirement and Slytherins personal libraries from the chamber of secrets. However in his years of captivity he had realized that without something to read the room wasn't the same. He could summon books at will, but those books were either empty or texts that he had already memorized.

He had almost gotten over the boredom, however he was able to get the Weasley girl to get him some books to read and had renewed his hunger for knowledge. Now he was starving, and knowing he was so close to Salazar's hidden libraries but not able to reach them was unbearable.

He should have gotten Harry to get him some before he left, not that the boy would have listened to him then but still.

Harry didn't really know how to get back; he was foolish to try to get back on his own. He stopped several times trying to wake up a portrait to help him get back to his dorm room. He was unsuccessful, the portraits either empty, and holding something that couldn't speak or they were too asleep to help him. He continued to stumble on, hoping that someone would find him so that he could get back.

He didn't know how he'd explain his midnight venture even if he was found. While he fumbled around he began to get more nervous. The castle was very large and he wasn't even sure he was heading in the right direction.

Harry began to panic. Sinking down to the floor, both hands against the wall he crouched there head leaning against the cool stone as tears streaked his cheeks. His stupid Griffindor-ish tendencies!

"Harry." The golden boy started at the sound of a strange feminine voice. It felt familiar though he knew that he'd never heard it before, nor the like of it before. "Grab my hand Harry." The voice was beautiful. It shimmered as it spoke and both calmed and excited him. Not in a sexual way, but in a way that made him want to take on the world and change for the better in some way no matter how small.

He blushed realizing he'd just been sitting there while this lady held out her hand to help him. He reached out his hand grabbing hers; she must have moved her hand into his grasp because he didn't have to flounder around to find it. She smiled, he didn't know how he knew that, but he just did, he smiled back moving his head up to face hers, rubbing the tears off his face with his sleeve.

Without prompt or warning she pulled him to his feet and began gently leading him. He remained silent trusting her as she led him down the corridors, through the twists and turns of the castle. She lead him to the stairs, warning him as they started to descend.

Harry was a little uneasy about this part, afraid to fall on his face. She must have sensed this because she squeezed his hand comfortingly. He managed to get down the stairs without killing himself, even though he stumbled a bit at the bottom when he expected there to be another step, but there wasn't. She smiled at him apologetically. Once again he was unsure how he knew this, but just shrugged it off guessing that it had something to do with his wild imagination.

He began to understand the situation he put himself in, he still had no clue where he was, and some strange woman was leading him somewhere, though she hadn't given any indication of where she would lead. Yet he couldn't bring himself to question her.

He heard creaking up ahead and the lady warned him to about a ledge as they went around the corner, and then there was another set of stairs. He heard a door open in front of him, walking through he heard it close behind him. He felt her place his hand on the bed before he realized that the snoring he heard was Ron and not another of the portraits.

He felt the hand let go of his and lay across his shoulder. "Goodnight, my child." He felt the hand fade away, but not her presence though it did grow more distant. He fell down on his bed, still in his close and folded the blankets over top of him instead of crawling beneath them.

Hearing the curtains close the voice spoke again "Sleep well" it said. And he did.


End file.
